New Paltz rally on Feb. 14 will focus on violence against women

NEW PALTZ, N.Y.-- The Village Board has authorized closing Plattekill Avenue at 3 p.m. Feb. 14 for a 45-minute demonstration in connection with the One Billion Rising campaign, which aims to raise awareness about violence against women.

A number of events are planned in the village that day.

"Eve Ensler, who is the award winning playwright of 'The Vagina Monologues,' recently discovered the UN statistic that said one in three women have experienced violence across the globe and will continue to," said Mary Groggin, a co-organizer of the local demonstration. "In our lifetime, another one in three women will experience rape or will be beaten. So that means 1 billion women will experience violence."

Ensler turned the information into a campaign 14 years ago with an effort to encourage women and girls to show solidarity in approaching community and government leaders.

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"So she decided to take it another step with V-Day (Valentine's Day) and created One Billion Rising," Groggin said. "She is calling on women and those that love them to rise up on the 14th and demand an end to the violence and to begin organizing in our communities to educate people about the crisis.

"The way people think about it, I think, is as these isolated, awful individual acts of violence against women," Groggin said. "Basically, what's happening is people are realizing there's a pattern to this and that ... it's a human rights issue and it needs to be dealt with that way."

Groggin said she is uncertain how many people will attend the rally because it is the first time New Paltz has participated, but she is optimistic about a show of support.

"You never can tell, but I have a feeling it's going to be pretty good because New Paltz is pretty good," she said. "... I think we're going to have a couple hundred people."

A social networking campaign is planned, as well.

"It's not going to end on the 14th; it's just the beginning," Groggin said. "We've had three or four fundraisers already for the domestic violence shelter, which is located in Kingston."

Groggin said a three-minute video produced by Ensler is posted on YouTube (it can be viewed at bit.ly/VBL6Rm) but noted it is accompanied by a "trigger warning" because some parts could be difficult to watch, especially by victims of violence.

"It shows the different kinds of violence that women are experiencing across the globe," she said. "It's a trigger warning for women who have experienced any kind of violence."